


Here Be Dragons

by vanillafluffy



Category: Venom (Movie 2018)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Medieval, Gen, Venom is a Dragon, Yes Really
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-13
Updated: 2019-07-13
Packaged: 2020-06-27 17:44:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,319
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19795861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vanillafluffy/pseuds/vanillafluffy
Summary: Venom is a dragon.





	Here Be Dragons

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Cozy_coffee](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cozy_coffee/gifts).



> For the prompt, "the rage of dragons". I've been turning this idea over for a couple weeks, and then I saw the prompt, so I figured it was an idea whose time had come.

He is a simple scribe with nothing to chronicle. As the pony wends its way south along the coast road, its rider sighs. Since his dismissal by Lord Doncaster, his existence has been tenuous. The pony, at least, can forage along the roadside, but he’s been reduced to eating whatever he can scavenge, which is precious little.

Perhaps he ought to change professions? A scribe is a learned trade--it isn’t as if everyone can read and write--but maybe he should put his way with words to use as a bard instead. True, he has no instrument and his singing voice is mediocre, but his ability to spin tales is unquestioned.

Well, save for Lord Doncaster, who hadn’t at all appreciated the ‘license’ he’d taken telling of the death of the first Lady Doncaster. His lordship, jealous bastard that he is, was enraged by his young bride’s flirtations and had her killed. He would have had it said that she died of a sudden fever, but Edward of Brock would tell no such falsehood. He’d fled the lord’s domain ahead of a squad of henchmen and in the month since, no one he’s approached has offered him aid, much less a position in their household.

Something bright twinkles in the distance. Out over the Western Sea is a spark of light relieving the early morning gloom.

Eddie reins in the pony and stares at the ember in the sky. It comes closer and closer--he estimates that it will strike the beach below the coast road. It isn’t a flaming arrow, nor one of those incendiary devices from the Far East--a shooting star falling from the heavens, perhaps?

The light dies away, but he sees a vast dark form plummeting toward the shoreline. There’s a thud of impact and some odd sounds, almost like grunts. Whatever it is, it may be valuable, Eddie thinks, tying the pony to a handy shrub. Either it’s something he can sell, or it’s a curiosity he can spin tales about and dine on the novelty of it. 

Quickly, he clambers down the narrow path that leads from the road to the beach. It isn’t quite a cliff, but it’s very steep. Eddie dislikes heights, but he hates being hungry even more. 

On the thin strip of rocks and sand between the precipice and the sea, it looks as if I huge black rock has fallen to Earth. It’s much larger than Eddie is, as large as a team of draft horses. He tries to make sense of what he’s seeing--it has spike and ridges and it’s twisted around…then _it moves._

 _That’s ridiculous, rocks don’t move,_ Eddie tells himself. _Therefore, it can’t be a rock._ The largest creature he knows of are great fish of the deep--but fish don’t fly any more than rocks do. _Maybe the wind? If it’s something light, like sail-canvas…but no, it’s a calm morning. Perhaps it’s slightly afloat with air trapped within and the waves are stirring it._

Eddie extends a cautious hand to explore the object. Neither a rock, nor a fish, the surface yields slightly beneath his fingertips. Slippery, but more oily than wet. For something that appeared to be on fire moments ago, it’s surprisingly cool to the touch.

Then he snatches his hand back, because it’s moving again. Definitely moving of its own accord. The entire form writhes, thrashing briefly as it contorts to look at him with eyes black as the abyss of Hell. Beneath them is a maw bristling with a great many jagged teeth.

Eddie stumbles backward. He sits down hard on the wet sand and pebbles, but he’s too amazed and terrified to even say ‘ouch’. He knows he’s about to meet his maker.

“Oh God, please don’t eat me,” he says aloud, with absolutely no expectation that the creature will understand him. “I’m not a bad sort. I know how to read and write, I don’t take things that don’t belong to me--if I did, I wouldn’t be so damn hungry all the time--and I’m kind to animals….”

The imposing beast heaves itself upright, crouched on four muscular legs. It unfurls an impressive set of black wings and stretches.

 _A dragon?!_ Eddie hardly dares to breathe. He’s never seen them, save for drawings, nor met anyone who’s claimed to. But it makes sense, because there is the sea, a stone’s throw away--every map he’s ever seen shows the ocean with the legend: “Here be dragons”.

Then the creature inclines its head in his direction and sniffs at him curiously.

Now that he can see all of it, Eddie is awestruck. A great deal of it is neck and tail. The wings are tremendous, like two great ships a-sail side-by-side. Its legs are as tall as he is, and the torso above them is twice again as large. From the crest of its head to the tip of its tail, it’s armored with spikes like a mace. It’s frightening, and yet--

“You’re beautiful,” Eddie tells it. “In an absolutely terrifying way. I wish I knew more about your kind. I could tell people about you. They’ve never seen real dragons. I’d never go hungry again.”

The dragon looks away. Raises its head above the level of the bluff, returning with Eddie’s pony struggling in its jaws. As Eddie watches, horrified, the dragon calmly devours most of it, leaving only one hind leg. 

**Meat for you, so you won’t be hungry,** the dragon rumbles. “Tell your people that Venom has come to your land, to hunt upon it. But I will hurt no man who does not challenge me. Is that clear?”

Eddie nods dumbly. “Where do you come from?” he asks, because the more details his story has, the more it can earn him.

 **Our land is beyond the great ocean,** Venom says. **I challenged one of the mightiest of our kind, and was banished. Now I will fly through the skies above your land until I have the strength to return and fight Riot once more.**

The thought of something more powerful that this monumental beast is chilling. “It isn’t going to come here, too, is it?”

**No need. There is ample to eat there. On the whole vast continent, there are millions and millions of grazing beasts and but a handful of our kind. Why would we want to come here?**

A continent? Eddie is stunned. No map or record he knows of has ever suggested such a thing. “Aren’t there any people there?” he wants to know.

 **There are. They call us ‘thunder birds’ and worship us as gods.** Venom preens. Eddie is afraid to tell him that he’s not likely to be so well-received here. He’ll warn people that they need to show Venom respect, but…. **I’m still hungry. That thing wasn’t very big.**

“I saw a herd of cows back that way.” Eddie gestures toward the north, the way he’d just come. “Just follow the road. It took us a while to walk it, but with your wings, it would be only a minute or two. Um…you’re not going to eat any people, are you?”

 **It is not the way of our kind, unless they are hostile to us,** Venom informs him as he springs upward, taking to the air with a mighty flap of his colossal wings.

Eddie watches as the airborne behemoth disappears to the north. Then he picks up the meat Venom has given him-- _Farewell, Fergus. You were a good pony._ \--and begins to ascend the path. Just as well he hadn’t left his rucksack tied to the saddle! There’s more wood for a fire by the roadside than on the beach. He’ll roast the haunch for breakfast, than set out to tell the story of Venom. 

What a story he has to tell! There really _are_ dragons beyond the western ocean.

…


End file.
